In the following review, Hower assesses Murakami's accomplishment in The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, offering thematic and character analyses.

The idea of the quest is as old as storytelling itself, occurring in tales all over the world. In one version an innocent young man goes in search of a woman who is held captive by an evil sorcerer. Along the way he is helped by loyal friends and supernatural beings. At the end he not only frees the woman but gains spiritual powers himself.

This story is one that Haruki Murakami, one of Japan's most critically acclaimed writers, has used to good advantage in his last two books. A Wild Sheep Chase and Dance, Dance, Dance, and again in his most recent novel, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. All three works feature unlikely knight-errants—yuppie dropouts—whose mild-mannered...